5.5 - Practical Investigation Flashcards
1
Q
What is your research question?
A
How do two different newspaper sources on 2 given dates, represent mental health?
2
Q
Hypothesis?
A
There will be a difference in the way 2 different newspaper sources on 2 given days represent mental health
3
Q
Procedure
6 AO1
A
- I looked online and selected 2 newspaper articles about mental health, one from Independent and one from The Sun
- The 2 selected articles that gave strong views on mental health disorders was The Sun’s ‘1,200 killed by mental patients’ and Independent’s ‘Schizophrenia: the most misunderstood mental illness?’.
- 2 newspapers selected from one in Feb and one in March that had articles about mental health disorders
- The two articles were read through to find the overall gist and meaning and representation of mental health
- The main points were put into themes of positive views and negative views on mental health which were generated from coding frames eg violence, which was noted to give qualitative data or tallied to generate quantitative data
- Conclusions about differences between the articles in attitudes towards mental health were then draw, such as The Sun viewing mental health more negatively
4
Q
Results - The Sun
Quantitative
A
Pos = 2
Neg = 15
5
Q
Results - Independent
Quantitative
A
Pos = 9
Neg = 7
6
Q
Results - The Sun
Qualitative x 2 pos and neg
A
- 20% of homicides are completely preventable had patients had better care and treatment
- overwhelming majority are not hurting others
- a “dangerous” paranoid SZ
- failure of communication between one agency and another
7
Q
Results - Independent
Qualitative x 2 pos and neg
A
- able to manage symptoms and live normal and happy lives
- someone with SZ wasn’t linked to violence and contained a message of hope and recovery
- always linked to violence
- mental image of someone with SZ was, ‘a man running about with an axe’
8
Q
AO3 - Strengths
x3
A
- Our research method was ethical as we used secondary sources of 2 articles, The Sun and Independent. We collected data by analysing these sources for themes and did not use any participants. Therefore there are few problems with informed consent when looking at peoples views on mental health
- Someone else could go and read The Sun and Independent articles about mental health and repeat the analysis, tallying the same categories eg ‘mentally ill portrayed as risk’ and negative outcomes from the articles. Therefore the content analysis is reliable as the media sources are permanent
- The quantitative data gathered about positive and negative outcomes from the articles from The Sun and Independent means that inferential chi squared tests can be carried out on nominal data. Therefore any differences can be looked at
9
Q
AO3 - Weaknesses
x3
A
- We only looked at 2 articles, The Sun and Independent which may have different readership to others such as The Mirror and The Guardian. Therefore, the views shown may not be representative of the wider view of the UK population on what their views are on mental illnesses.
- By doing content analysis on the 2 articles by The Sun and Independent, I had to choose and define categories eg label of SZ. Therefore there is subjectivity in the conclusions drawn from the data as someone else in my class found 4 tallies when I found 6, suggesting there is no interrater reliability
- Casual judgements about portrayal of mentally ill people in The sun and Independent articles cannot be drawn. Therefore cause and effect conclusions can’t be drawn on whether the media outlets are creating the negative views on mentally ill patients ore if the media are showing what the general population believes.
10
Q
Improvements
x3
A
- We only looked at 2 articles, The Sun and Independent so the views shown may not be representative of the wider view of the UK population on what their views are on mental illness. Therefore to improve I would gather info from more articles eg from The Guardian, Telegraph and Mirror to gain better representation on the UK population’s views on mental illness
- By doing content analysis on the 2 articles by The Sun and Independent, I had to choose and define categories so there is subjectivity in the conclusions drawn from the data as someone could have different views. Therefore to improve I would clearly define each of the categories before continuing with the content analysis. Eg instead of positive outcomes I would say affirmation or positive word mentioned before mentally ill patients activities to make the categories more specific
- I only looked at The Sun and Independent, which are both UK articles on peoples views on mental illness which means that its not representative of other countries and cultures. Therefore to improve I would get 2 other articles from Spain, Germany, Italy and Denmark to get a wider range of peoples views on mental illness that is more representative.